Tata Zest : Official Review

This is a discussion on Tata Zest : Official Review within Official New Car Reviews, part of the Team-BHP Reviews category; Hi all.
Nice review of TATA Zest. I was wondering that in the television advertisement they show the REVOTRON petrol ...

Hi all.
Nice review of TATA Zest. I was wondering that in the television advertisement they show the REVOTRON petrol engine to have 3 driving modes, viz CITY, ECO, POWER.
In the review there is only 2 buttons ECO and SPORT.
So how do you select the third mode, if at all there is one?

If this is true then it will be first of its kind in India, if not in the world.

Are you sure alloys are standard fit and not available as a company approved accessory for all models?

If I have to believe the Customer Advisor, then yes the alloys seem to be a standard fitment on all the variants. 5 days from now, on 12th Aug we will come to know this in black and white when Zest is launched.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Latheesh

Thanks for your report

Did you see any storage tray under front passenger seat? It will solve the issue of storing 1 liter bottle in Zest.

I couldn't resist myself and took the TD one more time. By now all the Customer Advisors in the office campus have started knowing me well. Vineet (Customer Advisor) welcomed me with a big smile for the second time. And the first thing he showed me after entering the car was the storage tray under front passenger seat. It can easily accomodate, not one but two, 1 liter bottles.

The Harman Kardon system is class apart and this is going to be one of the biggest USPs of the Zest. I could pair my ancient Nokia mobile with ease. I also received a call and the voice quality was crystal clear. The 5" touchscreen is very simple to use with very large fonts. And yes, even in broad daylight, I found the screen illumination to be good enough to be read even from the back seat. Few simple settings on the touch screen were:
1. Follow me headlamps can be set to remain on for an interval of 30s, 60s and 90s.
2. Speed sensitive volume control can be adjusted from the screen
3. The park assist beeps can also be adjusted.
4. For adjusting the fader just move the "+" sign on the grid with your index finger. When the sign was moved to lower left, only the rear left speaker was audible.

From the numerous test drives these fellows offered since morning, they said the most prominent feedback was the absence of auto folding mirrors. The Amaze and Xcent will have an edge over here.

Edit: The Customer Advisor couldn't resist asking me a question, "Sir were you associated with Tata Motors or any other auto company?" I couldn't hide my grin and said, "Well it is just my hobby" (Didn't reveal to him the secret, that I am a member of the most revered Auto forum of India. I cannot imagine what would have been his reaction)

Yes I saw the storage tray under passenger seat during my test drive, but this is not that high, so I would say just buy slim 'flat' bottles that you now get in shops that can go into these car door pockets. Its not a deal breaker at all.

The same storage tray exists in my Vista. You can easily fit 2 bottles of 1 Litre each. No matter of what size and shape. I have used it with 1 litre bottles of Tupperware(2 fit easily. they are round with edges), the Bisleri/aquafina ones, round bottles of other makes.

Wish to ask you guys that how did you find the sheet metal on the Zest? Was it thicker than those on D'zire, Amaze or the City? Asking this question since Tata have built cars which are stronger than the competition and hence wanted to know if the design philosophy has changed in this aspect. Or whether they have resorted to this common technique of cost cutting.

Wish to ask you guys that how did you find the sheet metal on the Zest? Was it thicker than those on D'zire, Amaze or the City? Asking this question since Tata have built cars which are stronger than the competition and hence wanted to know if the design philosophy has changed in this aspect. Or whether they have resorted to this common technique of cost cutting.

Apologies if this aspect has been covered in the discussion earlier.

Thanks,
Saket

It has been partly answered by the review and partly by the kerb weightof the car.

If this is true then it will be first of its kind in India, if not in the world.

Are you sure alloys are standard fit and not available as a company approved accessory for all models?

Quote:

Originally Posted by AutoIndian

If I have to believe the Customer Advisor, then yes the alloys seem to be a standard fitment on all the variants. 5 days from now, on 12th Aug we will come to know this in black and white when Zest is launched.

I believe yes. Alloy wheels seem to be standard in all variants. It is listed as part of the specifications (and not in features) in the Tata Zest website most likely confirming this. So that is one aspect while comparing the base & mid variant prices to DZire, Amaze & Xcent.

Aditya and Rehaan, thank you for a truly enthralling review. I read most of the automobile magazines and none of them are comparable in the detail you provide. I normally end the reviews wanting to know more, but not in this case!

Great review, am impressed. There are a few rough edges but I did not see any signs of "cheapness" and cost cutting that was so apparent in the Mobilio test

While agreeing with you, I would certainly like to have the issues indicated in these attachments to be absent in a car that I would like to possess.

This is where the Japs & Koreans score over the TATA product line despite being designed, engineered quite well, but in execution fall short of our expectations. Having said that I would like to pat TATA on the back so that they continue to rise well above what the Indian manufacturers in the monopolistic times dished out to customers who had no alternative.

Yes, many manufacturers place the spare wheel with the nozzle facing down in the boot. This does make it difficult to inflate the tyre or check the air pressure.

....

The reason why manufacturers do this, is to place the tool kit inside the spare wheel. When done with the nozzle facing down, the tools become accessible easily. Some manufacturers even have special circular (actually cylindrical) tool holders made of plastic etc. to fit exactly inside the spare wheel, such as this one:

(On some models, the cylindrical tool holder is placed under the spare wheel with its nozzle facing up, and a long bolt to secure the two. This makes it easy to inflate the tyre or check its pressure, but becomes cumbersome to access the tools.)

While placing the wheel with the nozzle facing down does make it difficult to inflate the tyre or check its pressure, this kind of placement has another advantage for those who need it. It forms the cavity to securely place a car safe - a special circular safe that is fixed inside the spare wheel. This can be done only when the wheel is placed such that the nozzle faces down. This is the kind of thing I'm talking about:

Tata has made a desirable car and just needs to ensure that it does not suffer from minor niggles. Most of Tata's vehicles are quite suited to the abuse that our non existent roads offer. This capability with the newer features and tech makes the Zest a very suitable contender for the buyer.

IMHO, this platform also offers a good possibility of spawning a compact 7 seater on the lines of the Ertiga and the Mobilio. The generous width of the middle row and the high ground clearance will be added advantages. I think Tata should seriously consider this option.

Forgot to mention one small thing yesterday. The cabin lamp has a single bulb. It would have been great if TML had provided two spot lights, one for the driver and another for the co-driver. Even my 10 year old Indica DLX has three lights, one central lamp and two spot lights. Very convinient if one needs extra illumination during the night.

I also asked the advisor, why TML did not provided rear cabin lamp for the back seat passengers. He defended it by saying that none of the compact sedans has rear cabin lamp. DeZire, Amaze and Xcent owners can you pl confirm this?

One good thing however is that TML has not skimped on the reversing lamps. There are two prominent reversing lamps unlike many European brands, which provide just on reversing lamp. Not only that TML has also provided one bright red, rear fog lamp that is mounted in the centre of rear bumper.

As an owner of two generation of Tata Indicas (DLX Turbo - 2007 and D90 VX - 2013), I will be skeptical, VERY-VERY skeptical to TATA's quality claims.
My Indica D90 VX (the short lived 90 bhp model) is much more smooth to drive than the older Indica DLX but the older vehicle had much less problems during initial years.

D90 was supposed to be the showcase product in terms of quality which turned out to be just the opposite for me, from turbo failures in first 1000 km to AC idler pulley breaking before 5000 KM to engine stall at 100 km / 5th gear to bunch of other problems in between leaved me thoroughly disappointed.

All of this when TATA's claimed that D90 is atleast as good in quality as Swift (well they own their mouth so they can shoot any thing from it... or so did I realize)

From few pictures of lack of fineness to even the test models (though this does not necessarily translate into over all quality or the lack of it), it seems they are not ready to learn any lessons from their past....

On a more positive note, unlike many after sales service remarks (on the negative side) I almost always had a very positive experience be it Concorde Motors Hyderabad / Bangalore, Tejaswini Motors Hyd (when they had newly opened there service center),KHT Motors Bangalore. In fact a positive experience with there service was the reason to go for Indica Vista again... and they have not failed me till date.

All the defects in new model has been duly acted upon with all seriousness, but service folks can only do so much if the vehicle itself is faulty, right out of factory.

On a lighter note, a senior guy at one of those service centers was quite excited as he had worked for Maruti (now)Suzuki Service center for 13 years before switching over to Tata due to personal reasons, he said that Suzuki vehicles were so stable and much less defective that he hardly had as much learning as he is having here in such short tenure, though he was sorry for me and few more customers (he sited Aria customers specifically) and wished TATA's build a more defect less vehicle to get a better reputation of there own

3 days to go before the launch.
As per carwale site Dzire starts from 4.85 lac and Amaze from 5 lac. I think Tata will price Zest on par at Dzire and undercut Amaze. Starting price should be somewhere around 4.80 lac. Interesting thing will be to see how they price AMT variant.